Why am I Here?

The best part about being a financially supported college student is that you have all the freedom and security necessary to contemplate life’s mysteries.  Why are we here?  Ah, the ennui of it all.  To read the original hipsters, Sartre, Camus, Simone De Beavoir, all contemplating the unbearable lightness of being that is L’Exisentialisme.  One cannot truly appreciate these masters of meh without enduring them in their original French.  This is where you take a long slow drag on your cigarette and exhale in a bored but thoughtful way toward the window.  Fin.

Fisher spent the first five years or so of his life living with his birth family in southern Ethiopia, answering to the name Weyesa.  He played with friends, raised goats and chickens, picked coffee cherries from his tree and learned futball from his older brother.  One day after his birth father died, he took three long car rides and arrived in an orphanage in Addis Ababa.   He lived there for over a year, sleeping in a room with 10-15 other boys.  Lots of kids would come and go.  Some would stay. 

One day, a man and a woman came.  “This is your new mom and dad,” Fisher was told.  Over the next few days we came by for fun but exhausting visits.  We showed him pictures of his new house, his family and Levi, the dog.  Then, we had to go.  We told Weyesa we would come back as soon as we could to bring him to America.  We gave him some gifts and we left.  It would be four months before I could come back to bring him “home” to America and his new family, life and name.

In so many ways, we’ve had the adoption experience people dream about.  The one people picture when they make up their minds, “this is what I want to do.”  We truly are blessed and lucky.  In March, Fisher will have been home for two years and I can’t imagine life here without him.

The other day, I was finishing my morning coffee and browsing the news, just a moment or two to relax before facing the day.  Fisher came into the room calling “daddy,” and walking briskly at me with a purpose.  He was a little impatient, like when he needs me to fix his iTouch so he can get back to playing Minecraft.   “Daddy, why am I here?” he asked me, straight out of the blue.  No time to prepare for this one.  “You mean here in America,” I asked.  “Yes,” he said firmly.

“Well, you were living in an orphanage and we didn’t want you to spend the rest of your life there.  We wanted you to come live with us.”  “Oh, OK.”  He spun around and was gone just as quickly as he came.  He went back to playing Minecraft in the basement with Tate.

There is nothing light about being.  That is especially true for those of us trying to process the bewildering mystery of international adoption.  We don’t have the luxury of contemplating l’essance de la vie.  I know I’ll never be able to give him a complete answer to his deceptively simple question.  I’ll aim instead for the security he’ll need to work it out and as much honesty as I can give him.